Malaysian Economy: Unfolding Growth and Social Change, by Rajah Rasiah (ed.), Shah Alam: Oxford University Press, 2012, 296 pp.

Malaysia is a growing and relatively open market economy. It has undergone structural transformation from an agricultural- to a manufacturing-based economy with signs of reaching the status of a service-based economy. As an independent country Malaysia has its half-century lifespan of 55 years, and the country’s economic performance thus far has seen broad-based growth despite negative growth blips faced in 1985-86 and 2008-09. Recently an attempt has been made to make Malaysia the world’s largest Islamic banking and financial hub (Sy, 2007; Bassens et al., 2011). Given the high profiling of the country in many circles as a model for latecomers (World Bank, 1993), the book under review is interesting as it is targeted at examining both economic and social change critically, but also serves as a textbook for interested readers.